Over at Baseball Prospectus, Will Carroll offers up an opinion on Jorge Posada’s injury, and how it may be treated going forward:

Ben Wolf . . . points out something about Posada getting hit by a pitch Wednesday that hadn’t occurred to me: “Was reading your latest column and saw that Posada was hit in the fibular head (I had just read knee in the general news).  Even if there isn’t a fracture, there’s a risk of the injury being more of a long-term problem if he ends up with any restriction in the superior tibiofibular joint, especially considering the demands of a catcher squatting on the knee (including that joint specifically I think), not to mention any mechanistic problems he could have running.  I suppose we will see.” . . . .  Posada says he could catch if it was an emergency, but it’s clear that it’s the squatting that’s the problem. We’ll see how the Yankees deal with this over the weekend, but expect Posada to miss time. At best, he could DH, but I think they’ll hold on to the retro DL move until they’re more sure.

Whenever I see Atlanta’s super phenom Jason Heyward, the odds-on favorite to win the National League Rookie of the Year, I think of Claudell Washington. Although Heyward is actually four inches taller and 25 pounds heavier, they have similar body types: they are both long and lean in the mold of a Darryl Strawberry, both left-handed hitters, and both right fielders. Additionally, of course, they are both African American. Heyward is more hyped–he is generally considered the top prospect among position players in today’s game–but Washington was also a highly touted prospect with the A’s in the early to mid-1970s.

Washington also possessed the perfect sporting body. He featured shoulders so broad that one sportswriter claimed he looked like someone who had stuffed a wire hanger into his jersey. From there, his torso tapered off to the slimmest of waists, making him look like a male model. Muscular enough to hit home runs, Washington remained lean enough to run the bases as if he were running track, the ideal combination of speed and power.

The A’s certainly liked what they saw, to the point that they brought him to the major leagues at the age of 19. At one time, the A’s regarded Washington as the new Reggie Jackson, only with more footspeed and better defensive ability. Well, it never quite happened that way. Disappointed in his development and his attitude, Oakland owner Charlie Finley dealt Washington to the Rangers for the paltry package of Rodney “Cool Breeze” Scott and left-hander Jim Umbarger. From there, Claudell went to Chicago as part of a package for Bobby Bonds. Washington patrolled right field for Bill Veeck’s White Sox, but Chicago fans did not take to the lackadaisical Washington. One disgusted bleacherite brought a banner to Comiskey Park, infamously displaying it in the right field stands. The banner pronounced three succinct but memorable words: “Washington Slept Here.” Given the way that Washington seemed to sleepwalk through games in Chicago, no one could reasonably argue with the sentiment.

The Mets eventually did the White Sox a favor by taking Washington off their hands, but only by giving up the measly return of minor league pitcher Jesse Anderson, who would never play in a major league game. Washington played one lackluster season in Queens before realizing the benefits of baseball’s newly created free agency. In one of the most puzzling contracts ever doled out in the free agent era, the Braves rewarded the mediocre Washington with a five-year deal worth $3 million. That might not sound like much in today’s baseball economy, but in 1980 it was the kind of money given to a superstar. While talented and still reeking of potential, Washington was several levels shy of superstar caliber. For all of his talent, he had never hit more than 13 home runs, and had never drawn more than 32 walks in a single season.

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A couple weeks ago, the closed captioning at Yankee Stadium translated A.J. Burnett as “A.J. Burning Net,” and I decided that’s how A.J. would be known in my household from now on. It also prompted me to check for A.J. Burnett anagrams*, which turned up, among other gems, A Burnt Jet and Nut Jar Bet. Being a natural pessimist, I tend to fixate on Burnett’s unpredictability. But when he’s on, he makes you forget all about those kind of jokes, and tonight was one of those nights; the Yankees strapped themselves on the back of the sizzling-hot Robinson Cano and cruised to a 4-0 win over Baltimore, winning the series and getting back on track after a few minor early-season blips.

Cano continued what I like to think of as his “Oh, You Didn’t Know? You Better Call Somebody” tour of the AL with two more home runs, a double, and a killer defensive play in the third inning  – ranging way over to his right, then hurling the ball against his momentum right to Mark Teixeira’s glove, throwing out poor Nolan Reimold with one step to spare – that left A.J. Burning Net standing on the mound with his hands on his head in disbelief, and Derek Jeter staring at him like he’d just grown an extra head. He provided plenty of offense all by himself, but the Yankees also scattered 11 hits and a walk against Orioles pitching throughout the game; Baltimore starter Brian Matusz did pretty well in limiting the damage to three runs in six innings.

The Yankee scoring began in the first, when Jeter came home on Alex Rodriguez’s sacrifice fly. Cano’s first home run, a booming no-doubter, came in the fourth; he followed it with a double in the sixth, and Marcus Thames knocked him home with a double of his own. Finally Cano burned Alberto Castillo for his 8th homer of the year, and this one wasn’t cheap either (Ken Singleton: “I’ll have what he’s having”). We’ve seen Cano do this before for a few weeks at a time, usually later in the season, and obviously he’s not going to hit .407 all summer; but it’s spring, and for now I think I’ll just enjoy the many pleasant possibilities.

The Orioles threatened only mildly against Burnett, who eased through eight innings and 116 pitches (77 of them strikes) even without much of a curveball, and Mariano Rivera polished them off with 13 pitches, fava beans and a nice Chianti in the ninth. It all looked easy tonight.

—

*That same (very productive) evening, I discovered that Curtis Granderson has by far the best anagrams on the Yanks, including but not limited to: Corianders Strung, Transcends Rigour, Scarred Tonsuring, Crusader Snorting, Sardonic Restrung, Contrariness Drug, Unerring Cad Sorts, Graced Rosins Runt, and Rug Torn Acridness.

Also, one anagram for Michael Kay is: Lama Hickey. You’re welcome.

A night after opening their series in Baltimore with a bumbling loss, the Yankees won a comparatively clean, crisp game 8-3, making life easy for ace CC Sabathia, who wasn’t in top form, but still gave the Yankees 7 2/3 quality innings. The Yankees got to Orioles starter Jeremy Guthrie early, putting up two runs in the first, three and the second, and holding a 6-1 lead after the third. The rest was just killing time.

Nick Swisher had the big day at the plate, going 3-for-5 with a two-RBI triple in the second on a ball off the base of the wall in center that O’s center fielder Adam Jones failed to field cleanly. The only Yankee who failed to reach base in the game was Alex Rodriguez, who still contributed with a sac fly in the first.

The only negative for the Yankees came when Guthrie hit Jorge Posada on the side of his right knee with his first pitch of the second inning. Posada stayed in to “run” the bases, jogging gingerly to second on Curtis Granderson’s single, then sauntering home just barely ahead of Granderson on Swisher’s triple. Francisco Cervelli went into the game in the bottom of the second and went 2-for-4 with an RBI the rest of the way.

The early diagnosis on Posada was that he just has a bruise and is day-to-day. Joe Girardi suggested that he won’t start the series finale, though Posada will be further evaluated on Thursday. For the short term, the Yankees should do just fine with the defensively superior Cervelli, who is 8-for-18 with a double and three walks in the early going, though there’s some concern about the fact that, with Posada out, Ramiro Peña is the backup catcher.

Failing to complete a sweep of the A’s, that was no big deal. Losing two of three to a good Angels team in Anaheim, you almost expect that. Losing the opener against a struggling Orioles team that had only won three games all season then looking back and realizing you have lost four of their last five, that’s a wake-up call. The Yankees need to win the next two games in Baltimore to avoid an embarrassing series loss to the lowly O’s as well as a losing record on their three-stop road trip. Fortunately, they have CC Sabathia on the mound tonight to help get the team back on track.

Sabathia’s last three games have been a near no-hitter and a pair of shortened complete games (six innings in a rain-shortened game, eight innings in a 4-2 loss), which makes this one of his better Aprils on record. One point of warning: CC has been pretty hit-lucky, holding opponents to an absurdly low .197 batting average on balls in play. As is typical for CC in April, his walks are up a bit, and his strikeout rate is no better than it was last year (which was a four-year low for the big lefty). We all know he’ll only get better from here, but those peripherals show there’s actually room for him to do so.

With Nick Johnson back in the lineup as the DH, Sabathia will pitch to Jorge Posada for the first time since Opening Day Night. That shouldn’t effect his performance, but Sabathia’s breakout game as a Yankee came here in Baltimore with Francisco Cervelli behind the plate just less than a year ago, on May 8, 2009. The opposing pitcher that night, Jeremy Guthrie, is on the hill for the O’s again tonight. All four of Guthrie’s starts this season have been quality (three of them against the Rays and Red Sox) and he has walked just five batters total. Despite that, the Orioles have lost all four of those games due to poor run and bullpen support. Guthrie faced the Yankees five times last year and turned in three quality starts, but his and the Orioles’ only win in those five games was Guthrie’s Opening Day matchup against, yes, CC Sabathia. In fact, tonight Guthrie and Sabathia face off for the fourth time dating back that Opening Day tilt. CC holds a 2-1 advantage in those matchups.

Despite struggling with his command and walking four, two of those free passes forcing in a run in the second inning, Phil Hughes managed to pass a 2-1 lead (courtesy of a Jorge Posada solo homer in the top of the fourth) to his bullpen after 5 2/3 innings and 109 pitches. Unfortunately, the Yankee bullpen coughed up three runs before getting the final out of the sixth. Boone Logan walked the only man he faced, and David Robertson, after getting ahead 0-2 on Ty Wigginton, hit the Orioles’ replacement second baseman in the backside, then gave up a trio of RBI singles to the bottom three men in the Oriole lineup before finally striking out Adam Jones to end the inning. Alfredo Aceves took over in the seventh, but in the eighth Derek Jeter booted a leadoff groundball by Wigginton and Jorge Posada threw a rainbow into center field when pinch-runner Julio Lugo attempted to steal second with two outs, setting up a crucial insurance run.

Baltimore starter Kevin Millwood was similarly inefficient, but lefty Alberto Castillo and righty Jim Johnson held the Yankees to just two hits over 2 2/3 innings, handing a 5-2 lead to newly promoted Alfredo Simon in the ninth. A Nick Swisher one-out single and a pinch-hit walk by Nick Johnson set up, sandwiched between strikeouts of Curtis Granderson and Derek Jeter, set up a pair of two-out Yankee runs, the first of which scored on an error on a groundball by Brett Gardner (which, curiously, was also how the first Yankee run of the game scored), but after Mark Teixeira got the Yankees within one and pushed Gardner to third with a first-pitch single, Alex Rodriguez’s hopper up the middle was corralled for the final out of a 5-4 Oriole win, their fourth of the season.

Hughes’ performance was actually quite encouraging. He allowed just one run on two hits despite having far from his best stuff, but he was undermined by sloppy play around him. In addition to Logan and Robertson’s failures in the bottom of the sixth and Jeter and Posada’s errors in the eighth, the Yankees gave away two outs in the top of the sixth when Robinson Cano, who has been thrown out on 54 percent of his stolen base attempts in his career, followed a leadoff single by being caught stealing. Jorge Posada followed Cano with an ironic walk, then with two outs was caught rounding second too far on an infield single to the left side (Nick Swisher singled off Miguel Tejada’s glove, and Tejada wrangled the ball before Posada realized he never had a prayer of making it to third base). The Yankee offense also failed to score a run with the bases loaded and one out in the third when Alex Rodriguez lined out and Cano flied out.

I’m tempted to chalk this one up to a hangover from the team’s big day at the White House on Monday (Michael Kay said during the broadcast that he had never seen Joe Girardi look more exhausted than he was Monday night). Hey, Randy Winn got his first Yankee hit, so that’s . . . something. Of course, he also slipped when attempting a throw home in the bottom of the sixth, resulting in a throw that barely trickled into first base from shallow right field. It was that kind of game.

In other news, Johnson, who has reverted to number 36 which he wore in his first stint with the Yankees, should be in the starting lineup Wednesday night, but Chan Ho Park was unable to throw off flat ground and thus seems no closer to returning to the Yankee bullpen.

I like to think I have a firm command of the obvious. To wit, the Orioles, who at 3-16 are four games worse than the next worst team in baseball less than 20 games into the season, aren’t this bad. After all, no team in baseball history has ever finished with a sub .200 winning percentage (the O’s are at .158 entering this week’s three-game series against the Yankees in Baltimore), and the O’s don’t profile as one of the worst teams in baseball history. What’s more, their Pythagorean winning percentage has them at a less compellingly awful .316.

Coming into the season, I thought that this would be the year the rebuilding O’s would slip past the directionless Blue Jays into fourth place, and I still feel that way. The Orioles have a solid collection of good young talent, some of which is still in the process of establishing itself in the major leagues, some of which could arrive in the bigs as the season progresses, and some of which may not even make it until next year or beyond. For that reason, when prescribing off-season strategies for all 30 teams for SI.com back in November, I said the Orioles needed to “avoid trying to buy in too early . . . Once those pieces have established themselves, the O’s can open up the coffers and flesh out the roster, but for now they’ll let [free agent Melvin] Mora go and should stick with inexpensive veteran stop-gaps in the infield . . . while giving the youngsters their opportunities.”

That’s exactly what the O’s did in bringing back the 36-year-old Miguel Tejada to play third base for $6 million, signing deposed Rockies third baseman Garrett Atkins to play first base for $4.5 million, and sticking with Cesar Izturis, on the second year of a two-year, $5 million contract, at shortstop. In a way, wins aren’t really what the O’s are after just yet. General Manager Andy MacPhail has been in enough rodeos to know that there’s no point shooting for a fluky 83-win division title in a division that also contains the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays. Instead, he’s taking his time, trying to get his kids established and sort the prospect wheat out from the remaining chafe. That sort of strategy can lead to exactly the sort of growing pains the O’s are experiencing now, but misfortune can create opportunity.

With the team desperate to get off the floor, manager Dave Trembley has found an excuse to bench the struggling rental Atkins in favor of minor leaguer Rhyne Hughes. Hughes is a 26-year-old rookie and not among the team’s better prospects, but he hit .301/.357/.510 in his Triple-A debut last year, and his time is now if ever. Hughes was the return for sending Gregg Zaun to the Rays in early August of last year, and if Hughes turns out to be a solid major leaguer, that’s essentially free production. If that happens, the decision to effectively leave first base “open” by signing Atkins will have been key to getting something for nothing there. Hughes has gone 4-for-9 with a walk in his first two major league games, one of which was the O’s third win of the season. That’s not terribly meaningful, but it’s better than having starting off with an 0-fer. Hughes is additionally compelling because the O’s top first-base prospect, Brandon Snyder, really isn’t. Snyder hits for average with some doubles, but he doesn’t walk much, doesn’t have significant home run power, and isn’t anything special in the field.

The O’s are much better off at third base, where they can thank another slick late-season deal for Josh Bell, who arrived from the Dodgers for lefty reliever George Sherrill at last year’s trading deadline. Bell is a big, power-hitting third baseman who is making his Triple-A debut this year and could be among the O’s prospects to arrive in the majors mid-year. There’s some concern about Bell’s defense at the hot corner, which makes him a peripheral concern in the first base picture as well, but wherever he plays, he should be a mid-lineup presence for the O’s in the very near future.

Add Bell and possibly Hughes to a lineup that already includes Matt Wieters and the outfield of Adam Jones, Nick Markakis, and Nolan Reimold, and the O’s have a solid young core that can be complimented through free agency or more deft trades. Before that can happen, however, those youngsters have to get their feet under them in the majors, which only Markakis has done thus far. Wieters and Jones are just 24 and Wieters, off to a solid start this year, has less than a full season of major league experience under his belt. Reimold, who like Markakis is 26 this season, is closer to Hughes than the other four and still needs to prove he’s a major league starter. The flip-side of the Atkins-Hughes situation is that the team’s start has been so bad that is has shortened the leash for lesser prospects such as Reimold. Despite a significant injury which will keep his primary left-field rival Felix Pie out until at least mid-season, Reimold, off to a slow start, has begun losing playing time to the still-older, still-lesser ex-prospect Lou Montanez (though Montanez is in the process of playing himself out of the lineup as well).

On the mound, the O’s have upgraded their brutal 2009 rotation by acquiring veteran Kevin Millwood, on the last year of his contract and thus effectively on another one-year deal, from the Rangers for reliever Chris Ray, who struggled mightily last year in his first year back from Tommy John surgery. More importantly, they’re already getting strong work from lefty Brian Matusz, who was the fourth overall pick in the 2008 draft and is a budding front-of-the-rotation starter and a popular pre-season pick for the American League Rookie of the Year. Millwood and Matusz effectively push Jeremy Guthrie down to the third spot in the rotation. Guthrie is still overextended, even as a number-three, and the final two spots are still filled by pitchers who probably shouldn’t even be in the majors, but that major league mediocrity is again just thin cover for budding prospects including Chris Tillman–who came over with Jones, Sherrill, and reliever Kam Mickolio in the Erik Bedard deal and got a taste of the majors last year at age 21–Jake Arrieta, a 2007 draft pick out of college who could join Tillman in the big league rotation later this year, and Brandon Erbe, who is making his Triple-A debut this year at age 22.

So the O’s have half a lineup, half a rotation, and following a shoulder injury suffered by fragile free agent closer Mike Gonzalez, not much to speak of in the bullpen, but those component parts remain compelling and potential building blocks of a future contender in Baltimore. Right now the Orioles aren’t a good team, but they’re not as bad as they’ve looked in the early going, and are continually getting better. The Orioles should move into fourth place for the first time since 2007, but they’ll still finish with their 13th-straight losing season, yet there remains reason for optimism in Baltimore.

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Sunday wasn’t Joe Girardi’s best day as Yankee manager.

Things seemed to be going the Yankees’ way in the early innings of their rubber game against the Angels in Anaheim on Sunday afternoon. Angels starter Scott Kazmir seemed oddly determined to hit Robinson Cano leading off the second, missing him with a fastball up and in then hitting him in the rear with the next pitch. Kazmir’s next pitch was also a fastball, and Jorge Posada sent it into the new trees beyond the center field fence to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. Marcus Thames followed with a ringing double, and the Yankees were in business.

Unfortunately, Thames was starting for the red-hot Brett Gardner (11-for-24 in the team’s last seven games) instead of the ice-cold (1-for-15 over the last six games) and lefty-challenged Curtis Granderson. So, it was Granderson who followed Thames in the lineup with a second-inning sacrifice bunt. Thames did score on a subsequent groundout by Derek Jeter, but (say it with me) when you play for one run, that’s all you get, and that’s all the Yankees got, letting Kazmir and the Angels off the hook with a manageable 3-0 deficit.

Bobby Abreu got the Angels on the board in the third when he homered off Yankee starter Javier Vazquez for the tenth time in his career (tying Manny Ramirez against Jamie Moyer for the most homers by an active batter off a given pitcher). Fair enough. Abreu clearly owns Vazquez, and though the pitch Abreu hit was a flat slider, Vazquez did start to get his fastball up to 91 mph in the third inning after starting out in the high 80s in the first two frames. In fact, Vazquez struck out the side in the third around Abreu’s solo shot, and he experienced a similar increase in velocity in the middle innings of his last start, a win over the A’s.

Unfortunately for Vazquez, he was no longer facing the punchless A’s in their forgiving ballpark, and in the fourth inning, things fell apart. After Hideki Matsui flied out. Kendry Morales singled, Juan Rivera was grazed on the forearm by a pitch, Howie Kendrick singled Morales home, and Mike Napoli worked a walk to load the bases. That brought up Brandon Wood, the Angels third baseman who has looked lost thus far this season and struck out swinging at a pitch that nearly hit him the previous inning. This time, Wood jumped on Vazquez’s first pitch, a hanging curveball, and hit a sinking liner to left field were Thames, again not Gardner, was playing. Thames broke late and made an awkward and unsuccessful dive toward what proved to be a two-RBI double that gave the Angels the lead. A Maicer Izturis grounder then scored Napoli to make it 5-3 Halos, and Vazquez’s day was over after 78 pitches in just 3 2/3 innings.

Pulling Vazquez there and then was the best decision Joe Girardi made all day, as Boone Logan and Alfredo Aceves combined to hold the Angels into the seventh, and Robinson Cano got the Yankees within one by extracting further revenge on Kazmir via a solo homer to left in the sixth (Cano’s third home run off Kazmir this season in just five official at-bats).

Then, with one out and none on in the seventh and Aceves having thrown just 15 pitches (13 of them strikes), Girardi brought in Damaso Marte to face Bobby Abreu. Marte walked Abreu on five pitches, but with David Robertson warm in the pen, Girardi stuck with Marte against righty Torii Hunter, whom Marte hit in the back knee with a slider. That put two men on for Hideki Matsui, a left-handed hitter whom, as Girardi should well know, has had considerable success against lefty pitching. Though he had yet to get an out, Marte stayed in the game and got a check-swing fielder’s choice for the second out, a lucky break that wasn’t quite enough to save the Yankees in this game.

Matsui’s tapper set up the key at-bat in the game. With men on first and second, two out, and the Yankees still just one run behind, switch-hitter Kendry Morales stepped into the right-handed batters box. Girardi initially called for Marte to intentionally walk Morales with the intention of bringing Robertson in to pitch to righty Juan Rivera with the bases loaded, but after one intentional ball, Girardi popped out of the dugout, seemingly to have Robertson issue the walk himself. Two steps out of the dugout, the Yankee manager froze, perhaps called back by one of his coaches, climbed back down into the dugout, called off the walk, then sent catcher Francisco Cervelli out to the mound, seemingly to stall for more time.

Marte’s next two pitches were balls anyway, and with the count 3-0, Girardi later admitted he thought of putting up four fingers again, but instead he, bench coach Tony Peña, and pitching coach Dave Eiland simply reminded Marte and catcher Francisco Cervelli that Morales would indeed swing on 3-0, implying that there would be no gimme strike. Nonetheless, Marte grooved a fastball, and Morales, true to the Yankee coaching staff’s warning, swung, connecting for a game-breaking three-run homer.

And that was that. Facing relievers Fernando Rodney and Scot Shields in the eighth and ninth innings, respectively, the Yankees managed only a leadoff walk by Mark Teixeira in the eighth that was erased by a Cano double play. The 8-4 loss handed the Yankees their first series loss of the young season and sends them back east with a sister-kissing split on their six-game trip to the west coast.

After the game, Girardi took full blame for his indecision in the seventh, uncharacteristically second-guessing himself for not going with his first instinct (the IBB plus Robertson). However, the amateurishness of that sequence of events overshadowed the other poor decisions he made in this game including starting Thames in the field when Nick Johnson was already on the bench with a stiff back leaving the DH spot open (Posada was the DH after a day off Saturday with Cervelli catching for the second day in a row), playing Granderson over Gardner then calling for a second-inning sac bunt from Granderson, pulling a cruising and efficient Aceves from a one-run game, and sticking with Marte at least two batters too long.

As for Marte, his description of the decisive pitch against Morales, delivered in his broken Dominican rasp, summed up this head-slapper of a loss: “Three ball, no strikes, you know. Waiting for a fastball. I throw the fastball in the middle. He hit.”

Yup.

With Joel Piñeiro going for the Angels this afternoon and Javy Vazquez taking the hill for the Yankees on Sunday, last night’s loss was a tough one for the Yankees to take, but while Kendry Morales’s two-run homer off Joba Chamberlain might have been the decisive blow, the more memorable one came in the third inning when Mark Teixeira, after being hit in the triceps by a pitch, rounded third and absolutely flattened Angels backup catcher Bobby Wilson, who was making his first major league start.

After the game, both managers (both former catchers) said they thought the play was clean, and despite a few more bits of accidental contact and hit batsmen later in the game, there was no jawing between the teams, no real sense of anger or conflict. Despite all of that, I thought it was a dirty play on Teixeira’s part, not only because Wilson had set up behind home, giving Teixeira a clear path to the plate, but because of Teixeira’s behavior in the immediate after math of the collision.

After leveling Wilson, Teixeira stood up and went back to touch home, clearly indicating that his initial target had been the catcher, not the plate. As he then spun back around to head toward the Yankee dugout, his eye caught Wilson sprawled out in the dirt, clearly in pain, but not only didn’t he ask Wilson if he was okay, he didn’t acknowledge him at all and showed no concern after returning to the dugout despite the fact that Wilson had to be helped off the field and carried down the dugout stairs. After the game, Teixeira spoke kindly of Wilson and said he intended to call him to make sure he was okay (Wilson was taken to a local hospital for a CT scan and was diagnosed with a concussion), but in the heat of the moment, I don’t believe Teixeira had any regard for the well being of his opponent.

Was it because of the hit-by-pitch? Because of the virulent booing he’d gotten from his former home fans at Angel Stadium? Was it boiled-over frustration because of his slow start? Probably not, though all likely helped bring out the red-ass in the Yankee first baseman.

We’ve seen that before. Last year, in a game against the Twins, Tex almost got into it with Carlos Gomez because the Twins’ center fielder was crossing first inside the bag and Teixeira was afraid of a potential collision. We’ve also seen him level catchers before. The first thing I thought of when I saw Tex flatten Wilson last night was the play in that wild triple-comeback game against the Rangers in May 2006 in which Jorge Posada was knocked back into the homeplate umpire on a collision at the plate but held on to the ball for the out. The baserunner on that play? Mark Teixiera. From Alex’s recap:

By the end of the next inning, the Yanks would have a one-run lead. But before the home team came to bat, Jorge Posada was involved in what will go down as one of the unforgettable plays of his career, let alone the 2006 Yankee season. With two men out, Hank Blalock laced a double down the left field line. The ball hugged the corner and Melky Cabrera fielded it nervously–he looks unfamiliar and uncomfortable out in left. Mark Teixeira, who had a great night with the stick and seems to have gotten his groove back, raced around second and now charged towards home. Cabrera finally got the ball to Jeter who fired to Posada. The ball skipped home in time, Posada fielded it and then was crunched by Teixeira, who lowered his shoulder and let him have it. It was as hard a collision as I can ever remember Posada being involved with. The blow knocked Posada backwards and into the leg of the home plate umpire. But he hung onto the ball and the place went nuts.

Best I can tell, Mark Teixeira didn’t play football in college (though he’s a big football fan, both college and NFL), but given his ability to lay a hit on an opponent, he should have.

So, Tex put a little extra heat in this series. We’ll see if anything comes of it. For now, the Yankees need to win two unfavorable pitching matchups to avoid their first series loss of the year. (I told you it wouldn’t be easy.)

This afternoon, Andy Pettitte takes on Joel Piñeiro on FOX. Both starters have been outstanding in their first three starts, Pettitte going 2-0 with a 1.35 ERA, Piñeiro going 2-1 with a 1.77, his one loss coming in a quality start in which he got just one run of support from the Angels’ offense. Piñeiro dominated the Yankees for seven innings in the Bronx last week, striking out seven against no walks while allowing just one run on five hits, the key hit being an RBI triple by Nick Swisher. The night before that, Pettitte held the Halos scoreless for six frames, striking out six.

To honor Hideki Matsui, this recap will be presented in 5/7/5 form:

Pre-game
Yankees and Angels
First of three at The Big A
A.J., Ervin, Ks!

Bottom 1st
A.J. Burnett wild
Walks Erick Aybar on pitch
That reached the backstop

AJ then wheels and
Catches Aybar trying steal
Who needs Posada?

Bobby Abreu
Jealous of Matsui-love
Shown by former team?

Abreu doubles
He states “No walls were hurt in
making of this hit”

Next, Torii Hunter . . .
Swisher slides for liner, but
Can’t hold it, two on

Matsui lines out
But then Kendry Morales
Chops a pitch, hang time!

Mark Teixiera waits
And waits . . . and waits for it to
Come down . . . But too late

Abreu scores run
AJ gets Juan Rivera
To fly out to right

Top 2nd
Santana is sharp
Through two frames only one hit
(A-Rod line single)

Bottom 2nd
Maicer Izturis
Brings Yankees only tsuris
Singles past A-Rod

Kendrick named “Howard”?
He flies out to warning track
Burnett not fooling

Who’s Bobby Wilson?
All Angel catchers must have
Six letters in names?

Napoli is one
Mathis is another one
Who cares? Wilson Ks

Tsuris stole second
While Wilson was striking out
But Aybar ends threat

Top 3rd
Swisher pops to short
Gardner lines hit down left field
First double of year!

Jeter mirrors Brett
Dumps double down right field line
Tying game at 1

Johnson K’s, close pitch
Teix hit on elbow (again?)
Takes first base, two on

Alex rips a hit
Past Izturis, a single
Jeter scores, 2-1.

Teix now at second
Cano drives score truck, singles
Teix charges round third

Plate was his to have
Wilson was out front, up line
Teix plowed over him

Wilson groggy, hurt
Was assisted off the field
No weight on left leg

That made it 3-1
Posada popped out to short
Could A.J. hold lead?

Bottom 3rd
Up stepped Abreu
He doubles again, off wall
Hunter lines to third

Alex snares it, throws
Off mark, Hunter runs into
Teix no harm no foul

Now its first and third
Matsui up, AJ gets
A pitcher’s best friend

4-6-3 DP
Run scores, can Burnett escape?
No, Kendry gets plunked

Rivera doubles
High off right-centerfield wall
Tie game now . . . field goals?

Tsuris adds to woes
He doubles, Angels 4-3
Pins in A.J. dolls

Burnett finally
Gets third out of the inning
On Kendrick groundout

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The Yankees hosted the Angels for three games last week, facing the same three pitchers that they will in this weekend’s three-game set against the Halos, and took two of three. Doing that again won’t be as easy. That’s because, after leaving the Bronx with a 3-7 record, the Angels flipped the switch, pealing off five wins against the Blue Jays and Tigers; because Jeff Mathis’s broken wrist has pushed Mike Napoli’s superior bat into the lineup; because Scott Kazmir, who pitches against Javy Vazquez on Sunday, shook off the rust against the Tigers in his last turn; because Joel Piñeiro was as dominant against the Tigers as he was against the Yankees; and because these games will take place in Anaheim, where the Yankees went 3-6 last year.

Tonight erratic stuff-misers A.J. Burnett and Ervin Santana face off. Burnett has gotten better in each of his starts in the early going and is coming off seven impressive shutout innings against Texas on Saturday. Santana lost his first two starts–one of which came in the Bronx and saw him give up five runs on five walks and eight hits (including solo homers by Nick Johnson and Derek Jeter)–but is coming off a sharp, 106-pitch complete game win against Toronto in which he walked none while allowing just one run on another solo homer (by Adam Lind). I’ll be impressed if either can manage a second straight dominant outing tonight.

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Among the finer baseball books to be published this spring is Chris Jaffe’s Evaluating Baseball’s Managers. Full of anecdotes and analysis, it’s an in-depth study of many of the most significant managers in the game’s history. Earlier in the week, Chris answered a number of questions about the book, including his thoughts on some of the most important managers to wear the pinstripes.

Markusen: Chris, in putting this book together, it’s obvious that you’ve put in an exhaustive amount of research and time. How much, if at all, were you influenced by the previous books on managers done by Bill James and Leonard Koppett?

Jaffe: Both were very helpful. Neither was the main inspiration, but both helped.  Koppett gave me a sense of how the position evolved over time. Early in his book, he talks of New York’s 1876 National League manager Bill Cammeyer. He owned the team and invented the baseball stadium.  Nowadays, he’d never be manager, but then the position was different.

The James book probably helped a bit more. (Actually, Bill James gets mentioned more times than any non-manager in the book. I suppose that’s not too surprising given that it’s a Sabermetric work).

The big inspiration from the James book was a little 2-3 page section at the end where he noted how often particular managers’ teams led the league (or came in last) in various categories.  It let you know whose teams relied the most on power, or complete game pitching, or whatever. James said the list came in handy when discussing various managers.

I liked the idea and thought it could be taken further.  I thought rather than just look at how often someone ranked first or last, note how often they came in first, second, third … .all the way down to last, average it out, adjust for league size (because coming 6th in an 8 team league is different from sixth in a 16-team league), and get a better sense of where managers stand in various ways.

That became the Tendencies Database, which is the main tool I used to look at individual managers.

Markusen: Based on the research you did for the book, who emerges as the greatest manager in the history of the Yankees? Did this differ from any preconceived opinions you might have had?

Jaffe: Joe McCarthy kicked so much butt he had to wear special shoes.  I knew going in he was terrific so it didn’t go against any preconceived opinions, but there you go.

Stengel is more remembered because he was better with the media, came in the early TV era (when the Baby Boomers can remember him), and last, but certainly not least, won five straight titles.  That said, McCarthy’s post season accomplishments were in their own way even more impressive than Stengel’s.  In his nine World Series, McCarthy’s teams not only won eight world titles, but they won 29 out of 38 games.  A 29-9 record is remarkable if it’s a midseason run, but it’s almost impossible to do that good when facing pennant winning teams in rival leagues.  Stengel’s Yanks won a bunch of closely fought World Series, but McCarthy went 28-5 in his eight triumphant Octobers.  They never even saw a Game Seven.  Heck, they only had one Game Six.  Stonewall Jackson once said an army conditioned to victory will become invincible.  That’s what happened to those Yankees.

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Wednesday night, Phil Hughes held the first 22 batters he faced hitless. Thursday afternooon, CC Sabathia gave up a hit to the fourth man he faced. That wouldn’t have been particularly notable if that hit hadn’t been a three-run homer by A’s catcher Kurt Suzuki that effectively won the game for the A’s.

Sabathia couldn’t locate his fastball in the first inning on Wednesday, and after walking two of the first three men he faced, he was supposed to throw a fastball down and away to start off Suzuki, who had hit two home runs off Sabathia prior to yesterday and also homered of Javy Vazquez on Tuesday night. Instead, he grooved a 93 mile-per-hour pitch on the inside half of the plate (see photo). After Suzuki’s blast, Sabathia worked in more changeups and managed to settle down, facing the minimum until giving up a cheap run in the fourth on a walk, an throwing error by Robinson Cano on a would-be double-play pivot (the Yankees’ first error since the second game of the season), an infield single, and a sac fly. Sabathia got out of that inning when Francisco Cervelli picked Kevin Kouzmanoff off second base, then again faced the minimum until the eighth thanks to an around-the-horn triple play started by Alex Rodriguez in the sixth (more on that below the fold).

Down 4-0, the Yankees cut the deficit against A’s lefty Dallas Braden with solo homers by Marcus Thames (who has successfully shrugged off his awful spring training) and Mark Teixeira, but otherwise managed little more than a series of long outs that were contained by the spacious Oakland Coliseum. No other Yankee reached third base in the game against Braden (who didn’t take kindly to Alex Rodriguez crossing the mound after making an out in the top of the sixth), set-up man Brad Ziegler, or closer Andrew Bailey.

The 4-2 final includes the Yankees’ lowest run tally of the young season. Meanwhile, Sabathia, after tallying a six-inning complete game in a rain-shortened win his last time out, again went a shortened distance, this time to an eight-inning complete game loss, needing just 97 pitches to do so despite six walks and five strikeouts.

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So Phil Hughes took a no-hitter into the eighth inning last night. How can this afternoon’s starter match that? Well, CC Sabathia has already taken a no-no into the eighth this season, getting two outs further than Hughes did last night, so he’ll have to come up with a new trick. Completing the Yankees second straight sweep and extending their winning streak to seven games would be sufficient.

CC needed just 73 pitches to get through six innings while striking out nine Rangers (and walking none) his last time out, and over his last two starts he’s allowed just one run on four hits and two walks while striking out 14 in 13 2/3 innings. He’ll face crafty 26-year-old lefty Dallas Braden this afternoon. Braden has shown improvement in each of his last two big-league campaigns and has been sharp in the early going, starting 2010 with three quality starts, all leading to Oakland wins. He faced the Yankees just once last year and was torched in the Bronx (seven runs on ten hits and six walks in 5 2/3 IP). A week later, an infected rash on his foot ended his season.

Nick Swisher returns to the lineup this afternoon while Curtis Granderson yeilds to Marcus Thames against the lefty Braden. Brett Gardner is in center. Francisco Cervelli catches the day game after the night game. After Cano, the lineup is Swisher, Thames, Cervelli, Gardner.

I remember watching Phil Hughes’ great, painfully cut-short start against Texas three years ago*, and thinking it was the most depressing 10-1 Yankees win I’d ever seen. Last night’s game was not nearly such a bummer: Hughes pitched the best game of his career, took his no-hitter into the eighth and was finally derailed by a comebacker bouncing off his glove, not by a key muscle making an unhappy popping noise. The Yankees won 3-1, and the Phenom/Phranchise nicknames would seem to be back in business.

Hughes walked Daric Barton on four pitches in the first inning, but put away the next 20 A’s he faced, 10 by strikeout, a career high. He got himself all the way into the eight inning with no hits and barely any drama – none of those dazzling close plays that Sabathia got in his no-hit innings of a few weeks ago. Everything was moving in exactly the way you’d want it to move, and while I don’t think his fastball topped 92 or 93 mph, that’s evidently plenty fast enough.

The Yankees scraped a pair of runs together in the fourth, when Alex Rodriguez tripled, and made it look like such a good idea that Robinson Cano decided to do the same immediately afterwards, later scoring on Posada’s groundout. Meanwhile, Hughes was being ostentatiously ignored in the dugout until the eighth, where with his pitch count still quite low and mostly made of strikes, he promptly allowed a hit to Eric Chavez. Well, kind of – the ball hit off Hughes’ arm and glove, and while he wasn’t hurt (PHEW… hey, can that be Hughes’ new nickname?), he also couldn’t find the ball for a few very long seconds. He regained his composure but as he reached 100 pitches with several runners on base, Girardi brought in Joba Chamberlain; one run scored before the Yanks could turn the game over to Mariano, who made things slightly more interesting that was strictly necessary in the ninth but, as usual, remained in control.

Pre-Mo, the Yankees got an ultimately unneeded but reassuring insurance run when Brett Gardner dunked a single into left to score Curtis Granderson (who, in case you were wondering, has been adjusting just fine to NYC off the field, too). Ken Singleton had just been saying, as Gardner faced a 3-1 count, “one more ball out of the zone and Jeter will come to the plate,” and I was thinking, hey, there is a chance Gardner will actually get a hit, you know. (I watched the Mets-Cubs game earlier in the evening and let me tell you, there is nothing like it to make you appreciate the Yankees’ lineup. The Cubs happened to win tonight with plenty of offense, but then they were facing Oliver Perez, and Lou Piniella still spent most of the game looking like he was watching someone strangle a koala… or, perhaps, like he would like to strangle a koala himself).

Anyway, as much as we all wanted to see a little history, it seems ridiculous to call this game disappointing. Hughes’ no-hitter interruptus didn’t bother me much, because it was just beautiful to see him pitch so well… and then to be available again in five days.

Now excuse while I go knock on all the wood within a mile radius.

—

*Holy crap, was that really three years ago?

Tonight the Yankees look to go five-for-five in series in the young season and extend their current five-game winning streak to six. If that should happen thanks to another solid start from Phil Hughes, the latter would be as encouraging as the former. Hughes looked sharp early in his regular season debut against the Angels last Thursday. Though he ultimately walked five and ran up his pitch count in turn, limiting himself to five innings, he also held the Halos to two runs on three hits while striking out six. For all of my grousing about Joba Chamberlain being wasted in the bullpen, Hughes is every bit as important to the future of the Yankee rotation (and thus the Yankees’ future) and his time is now. His strong debut was more than just the cherry on top of the Yankees’ hot start.

Opposing Hughes will be Ben Sheets, who despite being a veteran All-Star, has something to prove himself coming off a season lost to elbow surgery and ill-timed free agency. After three starts, Sheets has a 2.65 ERA, but has walked two more than he’s struck out and hasn’t pitched past the sixth inning, leaving room for the A’s bullpen to blow his first two games. It’s a compelling matchup of talented hard-throwing right-handers at very different stages of their careers.

Randy Winn will start in right field tonight as Nick Swisher gets a curiously-timed day off after returning to his old haunt and breaking an extended 0-fer. Maybe he was proving it all night, too.

Prior to last night’s game, Nick Johnson had walked in slightly better than one of every four plate appearances this season.  With 14 walks in his first 12 games, he was on a pace which would eclipse the all-time franchise record of 170 by Babe Ruth in 1923.

Now of course, Nick is a DL stint just waiting to happen, so that all-time mark is highly unlikely.  But he could more reasonably eclipse the more recent high-water mark of Jason Giambi, who got a free pass 129 times in 2003.

In the DH era, there have been only ten occurrences of a Yankee drawing 100 or more walks in a season, and Giambi has four of them.

Johnson’s .158 batting average (prior to last night’s game) will of course come back to more-normal levels, as he is a career .271 hitter.  Since 1990, there have been 78 occurrences of an American League batting title qualifier amassing 100 or more walks, and the median batting average of that group is .285, with a range of .223 (Mickey Tettleton in 1990) to .363 (John Olerud in 1993).

The A’s team the Yankees will face over the next three days is currently in first place in the American League West. That doesn’t mean they’re any good.  The A’s are 9-5, with six of those wins having come at home. Thus far they have gone 4-3 against the Mariners, 3-1 against the Orioles, and taken two of three from the Angels. That’s a solid intra-division showing, but the Mariners are missing Cliff Lee, and one of the A’s wins against the Halos came against replacement starter Matt Palmer.I’d say the A’s are headed for a fall, but they haven’t really climbed to any great height just yet. The Angels and Rangers, the real cream of their division, are just two games behind them in the standings, and with the Yankees coming to town, things are about to get serious.

The A’s have some pitching. Justin Duchscherer and Ben Sheets are currently healthy. Twenty-two-year-old lefty Brett Anderson is an emerging ace. Twenty-six-year-old lefty Dallas Braden, who will face CC Sabathia on Thursday, is emerging as a nice, team-controlled mid-rotation innings eater, and tonight’s starter, 24-year-old lefty Gio Gonzalez, is a prospect with good stuff, a nice high-upside option for the fifth spot. That rotation has posted a 2.70 ERA thus far, second only to the Cardinals in the majors, and home-grown arms such as Trevor Cahill (currently rehabbing an injury to his non-throwing shoulder) and Rutherford, New Jersey’s Vin Mazzaro provide depth with major league experience at Triple-A. The A’s bullpen, headed by 2009 Rookie of the Year closer Andrew Bailey, has been solid as well and should continue to be so.

That the A’s have been the stingiest team in the American League in the early going is particularly impressive given that they’re nothing special on defense. That their pitching has carried them to the top of their division is similarly impressive given that they can’t hit. In terms of runs scored per game, the A’s have been roughly league average in the early going, but their component performances, especially their .362 team slugging percentage (third worst in the AL and sixth-worst in baseball), are unimpressive. There is worse to come.

Here’s a question: who is the A’s best hitter? Is it Daric Barton, the first base prospect who finally seems to be clicking? Barton is an on-base machine, but he doesn’t have much power. His ceiling seems to be something like a healthy Nick Johnson. Is that their best hitter? Is it Kevin Kouzmanoff, the power-hitting third baseman acquired from the Padres? The right-handed Kouzmanoff has finally escaped Petco Park only to find himself playing his home games in a stadium that had a 77 park factor for right-handed home runs over the past three years per The Bill James Handbook (Petco’s was 86). Kouzmanoff has hit .284/.328/.477 on the road in his career. Is he their best hitter? Is it Eric Chavez, the man once tagged as the A’s franchise player whose bad back limited him to 31 games over the past two years and who, having returned as a designated hitter, has yet to start hitting again? Chavez has hit .249/.323/.439 over the last six seasons. Is he their best hitter? Their third-place hitter is Ryan Sweeney, a righty-swinging outfielder with a career .286/.343/.388 line in 1,109 plate appearances in the major leagues. Is he their best hitter?

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So, I thought I’d do a thing where, every so often at the end of a home stand or road trip, I’d pop in to take a look at how things are going for the Yankees. Call it “Howzit Goin’?,” make it a casual, quick-hit look at the team. Figured it would give me an opportunity to address what’s going right and wrong for the Bombers at that particular point in time. So here’s my first attempt, but I have a problem: everything’s going right.

What’s there to say? The Yankees have won their first four series of the season for the first time since 1926, doing it against their two primary division rivals (believed to be the best teams in the league if not the majors other than the Yankees themselves), as well as my pick to repeat as the AL West champs and one of their primary rivals. They open a new road trip tonight on a four-game winning streak having gone 5-1 on their just-completed homestand and 9-2 since their Opening Day loss to the Red Sox in Boston. Overall they’re 9-3, a record better than all but one team in the American League, that being the 10-3 Tampa Bay Rays, whom the Yankees took two of three from in Tampa the weekend before last.

The Yankees’ three losses break down this way: On Opening Day in Boston, they took and early 5-1 lead on the Red Sox, but CC Sabathia and the bullpen gave the lead back and then some, resulting in a 9-7 loss. In their first game in Tampa, the Yankees took a 2-0 lead in the top of the fourth, but Javier Vazquez, making his regular season debut, fell apart immediately after, giving up eight runs in an eventual 9-3 loss. In Vazquez’s next start, against the Angels in the Bronx, he again took a loss, but in that game, the Yankee offense was stymied by Joel Piñeiro and was unable to give Vazquez a lead. Trailing 2-1 after five, Vazquez gave up two more runs in the top of the sixth which sealed the Angels’ eventual 5-3 win (note that two of those three Yankee runs came against the Angel bullpen).

That last loss was the only one that could really be pinned on the offense, which leads the league with 5.75 runs scored per game and has yet to score fewer than three runs a single game this season. John Lackey actually had the best starting performance against the Yankees in the early going, holding them scoreless for six innings, but Andy Pettitte kept the Red Sox in check in that game and Lackey’s bullpen quickly blew his slim one-run lead and ultimately the game in ten innings (the Yankees’ only extra-inning game thus far). In addition to Piñeiro and Lackey, the Rays’ David Price, who beat Vazquez in his first start, was impressive, but did give up both an early lead and three runs on seven hits and three walks in total.

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Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press

If you’ve been married for any length of time, you know you have to choose your battles.  You rent the romantic comedy instead of the Tarantino flick, you hang the picture in the hallway during halftime of the football game, and you smile when she asks to share your dessert.  You have to draw the line somewhere, though, and it seems like most of us take our stand with the comfort items.  It could be a beat up chair, a worn pair of jeans, or an old pair of shoes.

Andy Pettitte is an old pair of shoes.  He’s been doing this so long that it’s expected and surprising all at the same time.  Sure, the stubble on the jaw is a gun-metal grey now, and his three-year business trip to Houston kind of puts an asterisk on Michael Kay’s constant references to the Core Four, but this is still Andy Pettitte.  So when he rattled off eight effective innings on Sunday afternoon in the Bronx, Pettitte looked just like the guy we saw back in 2009 or 2003 or 1996.

He allowed two runs in the third inning on a single, a sacrifice, a double, and another single, but he was coldly effective the rest of the way.  He walked Ryan Garko with one out in the fourth, then settled in to retire the next twelve Texas hitters, highlighted by the sixth and seventh innings when he needed only fifteen pitches total to record the six outs.

On the other side of the efficiency coin was Texas starter Rich Harden.  Harden’s been on my fantasy team for the past couple seasons, so I’ve seen this game about a thousand times.  His stuff is great, far better than Pettitte’s, so he was able to strike out five hitters in only three and two-thirds innings, but the the problem was that he also gave up six walks and five base hits.  The strikeouts and walks would naturally lead to a high pitch count, but here’s a hidden stat that doomed Harden: Yankee hitters fouled off 22 of his pitches; Ranger batters managed only three foul balls during Pettitte’s eight innings.

Meanwhile, the Yankees cobbled together five runs with a sacrifice fly here, a bloop single there, and a couple of home runs, only one of which is interesting enough to talk about here.  The struggling Mark Teixeira hit his first home run of the season, and as he rounded the bases in his usual high-stepping trot, looking like a man running through three feet of snow, I wondered if he might finally be coming around.  I know we all know that Teixeira starts slowly, but just as a reminder, I looked it up.  Take a look at where he was on the morning of April 19th in each the past several years.  (And to make you feel better, I’ve included his finishing slash stats as well.)

2003: .149/.216/.298 — .259/.331/.480
2004: Injured in April — .281/.370/.560
2005: .224/.308/.397 — .301/.379/.575
2006: .321/.410/.528 — .282/.371/.514
2007: .204/.339/.224 — .306/.400/.563
2008: .203/.282/.375 — .308/.410/.552
2009: .194/.333/.548 — .292/.383/.565
2010: .114/.291/.205 — ????/????/????

The numbers don’t lie.  Sooner or later, he’ll be fine.  The hitters say that sometimes one swing is all it takes to find what’s been missing; here’s hoping that Big Tex has found it.  But back to our game…

Everything ended when another pair of comfortable shoes, Mariano Rivera, trotted in from the dugout and closed things out with a spotless ninth inning. Yankees 5, Rangers 2.  As noted everywhere, the Yanks have won their first four series, the first time that’s happened since 1926, and all is happy in the Bronx.